‘Uncle Roger’ comedian has popular Chinese social media account shut down over video mocking Beijing

Cancellation of London-based character comedian’s account comes amid debate in China over future of stand-up

Uncle Roger blocked from Weibo over China joke (Screengrab/ mrnigelng)

London-based comedian Nigel Ng has been banned from Chinese social media platforms after he published a video mocking China's tough policies on issues ranging from surveillance to Taiwan.

Malaysia-born Ng, who is best known for his character "Uncle Roger" and has more than 7.7 million subscribers on YouTube, was suspended from the Twitter-like Chinese platform Weibo, where his account had accumulated 400,000 followers.

His account was “currently in a state of being muted” due to a "violation of relevant laws and regulations", according to a message on the page.

His homepage on the Chinese video site Bilibili was also placed “under suspension”, the Strait Times reported.

The ban comes amid the Chinese government's ongoing crackdown on stand-up comedy, a form of entertainment that had managed to gain popularity with performances that just about toed the line when it came to censorship.

Ng last week posted a trailer of his new stand-up show on Twitter, where he jokes about China’s surveillance and asks the Chinese Communist Party not to "make him disappear".

In the video, Ng talks to a member of the audience, who said they are from Guangzhou province in China.

"China, good country, good country," Ng responded. “We have to say that now, correct?” he asked, before taking a jab at the Chinese government.

"All the phone listening. All the phone listening," he continues, referring to accusations of surveillance through popular tech firms like Huawei. "This nephew got Huawei phone, they all listening.

"All our phones, tap into it: Long live president Xi [Jinping]," he said.

Ng then asked the audience if anyone was from Taiwan. “Not a real country,” he said sarcastically. “I hope one day you rejoin the motherland. One China."

Then Ng appears to have predicted the fallout of his comments in China, saying: "Uncle Roger gonna get cancelled after tonight.

"Go write good report for Uncle Roger," he told his audience. "Dear CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Uncle Roger good comrade. Good comrade. Don't make him disappear please," he quipped.

Ng’s stand-up show is slated for release on 4 June – the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre of students and pro-democracy protesters.

It is not the first time that the 32-year-old comedian has faced the heat for comments on China.

In 2021, Ng was criticised after he took down a video featuring popular food blogger and China-critic YouTuber Mike Chen. Ng reportedly apologised at the time, saying the video “had made a bad social impact” and he was not aware of Chen’s “political thoughts and incorrect comments about China in the past".

Comedians in China are now worried about the government’s increasing intolerance of stand-up comedy, which gained popularity during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Last week Chinese comedian Li Haoshi, who goes by the stage name House, was arrested after he poked fun at the military, comparing the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to dogs chasing a squirrel.

In the joke, Li recounted seeing two stray dogs he had adopted chase a squirrel and said it had reminded him of the phrase “have a good work style, be able to fight and win battles”.

The punchline is a slogan Chinese president Xi Jinping used in 2013 to praise the PLA's work ethic.

The company that hired him for the event in Beijing was fined 14.7m yuan (£1.7m).

“Stand-up comedy has been the last bastion in which people ... can still enjoy entertaining commentary about public life,” Beijing-based independent political analyst Wu Qiang told Reuters.

“After this, the space for stand-up comedy and public expression in general will inevitably keep shrinking.”

A number of shows had been cancelled in the wake of the incident, a Beijing-based comedian said on the condition of anonymity.

China's leadership "fed an atmosphere of paranoia and fear over national security risks, defined so expansively that anything can be an attack," said David Bandurski, director of the China Media Project, a US-based research group.

"A punchline is treated with the same alarm as a real assault on the nation."